Okay, sure. Keep Tier 1 separate if it keeps CBS happy and players from revolting. Heck, make the tutorial bigger and better and cover the entire lifespan of a Tier 1 ship.

Then... You get your "real" ship. Could be a Prometheus or a Galaxy or an Excelsior or a Vesper.

Ship Tiers themselves don't really make sense. We level too quickly for them to be of any longterm value at lower tiers. Slowing down leveling at this point would just feel like a penalty. (Simple design philosophy thing with MMOs and DLC game: nothing should be harder than it is when it launches. Shy of exploits patched out, no point AFTER launch should be harder than launch. By launching a certain way, you set expectations.)

It's a lot of work for less than six to eight hours of playtime in return. Missions have replay value. Lower tier ships don't. Tiering inherently devalues any work done on older assets just like Blizzard throws its old art under the bus by not having an appearance tab.

Tiered visual progression really has to be a case of haves and have nots to make people happy. By which I mean, things that are rare and valuable that you want people to grind/craft/PvP/raid/spend real money for should be something distinct from what most people have. But once people HAVE something, it should never be less relatively useful than it was the day we got it.

Look at it this way. I buy a Rhode Island class ship. I go run the Devidian Series. I have fun. The Devidian series scales with me. The ship doesn't. One of these things is more valuable than the other because of longterm appeal.

Sure, there's the console. But why have the overhead of CapnLogan designing these pretty ships if what people are really buying are the consoles? Why pay for a costume with an expiration date?

At the VERY least, I think any and all C-Store ships and ship costumes should come with an out of combat holo-emitter for that class of ship so there's at least a convenient way to enjoy ownership. If you have to make it break in combat for IP reasons, whatever.

But I think tiers are a bad idea in general. It's one thing if a ship has to be earned or bought. But why buy them if the value on them expires. Low tier ships are pointless. If someone isn't at endgame, why would they spend money except to level faster? And if a C-Store leveling ship provides speedier leveling, it devalues itself because you get a narrower window on the pretty art.

I sincerely think more work needs to be done to get people past the lower levels and out of those levels... and more visual items that will be stuck in those low levels make NO sense.

Archived Post

08-08-2011 11:44 AM

I think getting rid of the tier system would bea good thing. Our beloved Captains from the shows didnīt switch their ships every couple of episodes. In a way the "hero ships" were like characters themselves, quite distinct.
Apart from T1 vessels, every ship pretty much can be imagined as being upgraded over time. :)

Archived Post

08-08-2011 11:44 AM

More to the point:

Cryptic is eliminating the exploration badges at low tiers because people out level them before they're useful. We're moving towards emblems at all ranks so that work put in while leveling is more beneficial at endgame.

And then... we're seeing more low tier ships added, often at ranks where the currencies are being eliminated because people never get to enjoy those currencies because they outlevel them.

Archived Post

08-08-2011 11:50 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Leviathan99

More to the point:

Cryptic is eliminating the exploration badges at low tiers because people out level them before they're useful. We're moving towards emblems at all ranks so that work put in while leveling is more beneficial at endgame.

And then... we're seeing more low tier ships added, often at ranks where the currencies are being eliminated because people never get to enjoy those currencies because they outlevel them.

Seem to be contradicting design philosophies at work here for certain. And they could still sell variants of existing ships in the c-store, not more powerful but just different. Consoles should probably be sold separately.
:)

Archived Post

08-08-2011 01:22 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Leviathan99

More to the point:

Cryptic is eliminating the exploration badges at low tiers because people out level them before they're useful. We're moving towards emblems at all ranks so that work put in while leveling is more beneficial at endgame.

And then... we're seeing more low tier ships added, often at ranks where the currencies are being eliminated because people never get to enjoy those currencies because they outlevel them.

I thought they were consolidating the Exploration Merits, not getting rid of them. :confused:

Anyhow, reading this thread regarding ships, I got an idea that instead instead of just unlocking Captain Abilities, when we get promoted our ships gain a refit and is upgraded to similar. Then after a point it becomes too obsolete to carry on to higher Tiers.

For example:

The TOS Consitution being refit to the Refit Consitution and gaining the second aft weapon port and the improved BO slots. In Tier 3, you would gain a partial refit in gaining 1 front weapon port and instead of upgrading the LT Enginerring to a LTC Engineering, its goes to 2 LT Engineering slots. Right there it doesn't replace the Tier 3 Cruisers and its still playable.

And it could continue into higher Tiers, for instance in Tier 4, your Updated Consitution no longer gaining a Weapon or BO slots, instead it would be unlocking a unique ability like being harder to hit due to the smaller profile and higher speeds that would be inline with an escort. Of course by the time you hit Tier 5, the ship would be functional to play in, except in PvP and STFs.

I believe that if Cryptic added other traits like Warp Cores, and such things might be helpful later on. Like Galaxies having the most power available, Sovereigns having thicker armor (more AP), and smaller ships like a Consitution or the Defiant wouldn't have the same power requirements. This possibly could even help out in PvP where you only got X ammount of power available and if you load up on weapons, you won't have power for other systems.

Just a thought.

Archived Post

08-08-2011 01:26 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Leviathan99

Isn't the best solution to eliminate tiers?

Okay, sure. Keep Tier 1 separate if it keeps CBS happy and players from revolting. Heck, make the tutorial bigger and better and cover the entire lifespan of a Tier 1 ship.

Then... You get your "real" ship. Could be a Prometheus or a Galaxy or an Excelsior or a Vesper.

Ship Tiers themselves don't really make sense. We level too quickly for them to be of any longterm value at lower tiers. Slowing down leveling at this point would just feel like a penalty. (Simple design philosophy thing with MMOs and DLC game: nothing should be harder than it is when it launches. Shy of exploits patched out, no point AFTER launch should be harder than launch. By launching a certain way, you set expectations.)

It's a lot of work for less than six to eight hours of playtime in return. Missions have replay value. Lower tier ships don't. Tiering inherently devalues any work done on older assets just like Blizzard throws its old art under the bus by not having an appearance tab.

Tiered visual progression really has to be a case of haves and have nots to make people happy. By which I mean, things that are rare and valuable that you want people to grind/craft/PvP/raid/spend real money for should be something distinct from what most people have. But once people HAVE something, it should never be less relatively useful than it was the day we got it.

Look at it this way. I buy a Rhode Island class ship. I go run the Devidian Series. I have fun. The Devidian series scales with me. The ship doesn't. One of these things is more valuable than the other because of longterm appeal.

Sure, there's the console. But why have the overhead of CapnLogan designing these pretty ships if what people are really buying are the consoles? Why pay for a costume with an expiration date?

At the VERY least, I think any and all C-Store ships and ship costumes should come with an out of combat holo-emitter for that class of ship so there's at least a convenient way to enjoy ownership. If you have to make it break in combat for IP reasons, whatever.

But I think tiers are a bad idea in general. It's one thing if a ship has to be earned or bought. But why buy them if the value on them expires. Low tier ships are pointless. If someone isn't at endgame, why would they spend money except to level faster? And if a C-Store leveling ship provides speedier leveling, it devalues itself because you get a narrower window on the pretty art.

I sincerely think more work needs to be done to get people past the lower levels and out of those levels... and more visual items that will be stuck in those low levels make NO sense.

I agree the current tier system isn't working very well. The devil as they say is in the details though, so what would replace the current tier system?

I've mentioned this before, but I wonder if Cryptic does have something in mind to fix this problem. I'm referring to the mentioned ship building system for season 5 (which would be at least 5 months out though).

At the VERY least, I think any and all C-Store ships and ship costumes should come with an out of combat holo-emitter for that class of ship so there's at least a convenient way to enjoy ownership. If you have to make it break in combat for IP reasons, whatever.

A ship holo-emitter that comes with c-store ship would be a nice compromise, but why not just go all the way and have a normal vanity/appearance option for all ships? Maybe exclude T1 ships and require for example cruisers only being able to use other cruisers as vanity skins and so on. Just turn it off in PVP.

I do not see them changing the tier system unless there is a large and vocal player demand for it. Then comes the question of what to put in its place.

I am personally not going to buy any low tier c-store ships even if I decide to level another character. There is just not enough value in it for me even if they add ships I really like. If I could still use the ships appearance on higher tier ships even if just in PVE I would reconsider.

Archived Post

08-08-2011 08:53 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Azurian
(Post 3689036)

I thought they were consolidating the Exploration Merits, not getting rid of them. :confused:

Anyhow, reading this thread regarding ships, I got an idea that instead instead of just unlocking Captain Abilities, when we get promoted our ships gain a refit and is upgraded to similar. Then after a point it becomes too obsolete to carry on to higher Tiers.

See... I think it would have been cool if they had just has, say 12-20 ships available at Lt. Commander (with an expanded 10 level tutorial that prepares players for the choice and variety)

But then maybe have the ships gain device slots and cosmetic variants at each rank.

So, for example, at Lt. Commander you have the Connie Refit. But each rank up, you get a new cosmetic variant to mix in. That would naturally skew people towards newer looking ships if the ships you got at Lt. Cmdr consistently looked dated and then gradually got sleeker and newer looking options to swap out to as you rank up.

So maybe your Connie gets Excelsior nacelles and the Vesper options at Commander. At Captain, it would get an Ambassador-style TNG-ish makeover. And then at RA LH, it unlocks the Excalibur options, which give it the late TNG era look. You could always USE the older options but you'd look lower ranked by doing so and the pressure would then be on Cryptic to continue producing new ranks with unifying "Tier" upgrades.

So... For example, with the Intrepid, my idea would be to introduce two lower tiers of costume you get first that look more like TOS films and TNG, you arrive at the Intrepid costume unlock, and get new variants each tier.

Same ship but it would evolve through the Trek design philosophies by each rank up expanding the customizability of the look.

Archived Post

08-08-2011 09:09 PM

Another thought is to mix the ******** player community notion of gear score with City of Heroes' arena system (where you use pets) with the pet system in STO which will eventually include ships.

So... A level 10 mission would have a "budget" of 1000 points and a Level 50 mission would have a budget of 5000 points. A Connie would be worth 1000 points. A shuttle might be worth 500. A Galaxy, non-refit, might be worth 4000 points. A Nova would be worth 2000 points.

So.... You do a level 10 mission, you have to swap down to a Connie or a shuttle and one shuttle as a pet.

You do a level 50 mission and you could use 1 Galaxy and 1 Connie, 10 shuttles (9 of which are pets), 1 Sovereign, 2 Novas and 1 Connie, etc.

This way, you would design it so that mission XP scales but content doesn't and you'd use have to use lower tier ships for lower tier mission replay.

I think this way would be the best but would require some rethinking of Remastered episodes and Feature episodes being level scaling. You scale to the mission based on what you're allowed to bring. The mission doesn't scale to you.